


To Despise, To Hate, To Wish to Watch Die

by CrumblingAsh



Category: Iron Man - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Break Up, Grief/Mourning, Post-Avengers: Age of Ultron (Movie), Suicide, Suicide Notes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-01
Updated: 2015-06-01
Packaged: 2018-04-02 08:16:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4052992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrumblingAsh/pseuds/CrumblingAsh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>"I made a promise, when I was in that cave. Not to anyone in particular, not even really ... aloud. Just a promise. That I would rid the people of everything I had ever made that could hurt them; every missile, every bomb, every single gun. I would destroy every weapon. Everyone thinks - hell, even I did, for a while - that I made the armor to protect <b>me</b>, but it's not true. I made the armor to protect the world from what I had made.</i>
</p><p> </p><p>  <i>It took me a little too long to realize to realize that it isn't really the weapons that are the problem. They're just the ... symptoms, I guess, if you want a relatable term. They're the symptoms of a sickness. And, just in case anyone hasn't caught on by now, that sickness? It's me."</i></p><p> </p><p>  <b>Post Age of Ultron</b></p>
            </blockquote>





	To Despise, To Hate, To Wish to Watch Die

 

* * *

 

 

"Where is Tony Stark now?" Reporters question on the news stations. They're voicing questions sent in by viewers. Hundreds. Thousands. "Many are calling for him to take responsibility of the destruction his dubbed "Iron Legion", the desolation of Sokovia and the now thousands of people left homeless after their city fell from the sky in literal pieces-."

"-the Avengers were seen fending off and fighting these robots while rescuing civilians from the bizarrely floating Sokovia, and while many are hailing them as heroes once again, there does remain the fact that these robots bare a striking resemblance to Tony Stark's "Iron Legion". A few are questioning if hackers have been involved, or possibly Hydra, but more still are questioning Tony Stark himself-."

They have no idea.

None.

They don't know what he's capable of. They can't even think about it.   

 

* * *

 

 

There are no words in existence, in any known language, that could ever do justice to Virginia Potts.

Physically – _stunning,_ maybe? _Angelic, awe-inspiring, breathtaking? Perfection,_ close. _Goddess,_ closest.Still so very inaccurate.

Looking at her brings a pain Tony is always all too willing to take upon himself, to use a knife to bring himself, if he has to. Her smile makes his chest contract, her laughter makes his heart seize, her kisses steal his breath completely, and there have been times where he’s never been sure he could die, so long as she’s there for him to pull life from. Pepper is an ember – a _flame_ , her cool personality and fiery temper encompassing, igniting, inspiring him.

(Her touch quiets him; she’s like a goddamn switch God forgot to install him with and had to put into the form of another person. Her hand on his wrist closes his mouth, her fingers on his neck calm him down. She rakes her fingernails over his scalp and he’s nothing, he’s hers, whatever she wants he’ll do, whatever she needs she’ll have, how far does she need him to bend, because he’ll break nearly every bone to become the form).

“I don’t understand,” she whispers.

Pepper isn’t touching him now, because he’s asked her not to, because he had stepped back when she’d tried. And he doesn’t touch her, even though his body yearns to, because he can’t.

“You don’t come first for me,” he tells her honestly, swallows down the emotions that want to crack into his voice (Stark men are made of iron), watches as her beautiful blue eyes widen at the blunt delivery of the truth they’ve both always known. “You never have, Pep. And you’re never going to. I’m not trying to be mean, I just – it’s what it is.”

“Tony, if this is about Ultro-.”

“It’s not,” he cuts off quietly. “You know it’s not, Pepper. I know you know.”

She doesn’t cry, because while Stark men are made of iron, Pepper Potts is born of it. But he can see the tears, brimming along the edges, and knows from experience that they must burn, and her lips thin, drawing in tight (she’s nibbling on the lower one, inside her mouth, a nervous tick he adores).

“You don’t _need_ someone who’s going to be that person for you,” he says, goes for a grin against the growing pale of her face. “But you deserve them. You deserve someone who will work with you to build the world up, not just use you to burn down what they don’t like. Let’s face it, I’ve only ever been using you.”

Pepper doesn’t say anything. She doesn’t have to.

He doesn’t help her pack her bags; he calls in Happy, and then hides in the workshop. Waits a day, and then two, until it’s relatively conceivable that she’s gone. So fast. She’s gone so fast.

 _‘You deserve better than me,’_ he doesn’t say to an empty Tower.

(Happy goes with Pepper. Happy always goes with Pepper. “Happy Pepper” his mind supplies. It works, and it’s less to say).

 

* * *

 

 

In a box in the back of the closet of Bruce’s lab, there’s an old revolver that’s in perfect condition that had belonged, at a time, to Howard Stark.

Tony had given it to the scientist as a gag gift. As permission to continue to try.

When he opens it, after Pepper’s left, after the silence starts to become a little suffocating, he’s the first one to have touched it in over twenty years.

 

* * *

 

 

Hell, but Rhodey’s happy.

Tony’s not sure he’s ever seen Rhodey this happy – superhero is a good look for him.

Tony had had “friends” before the overly-serious James Rhodes had stepped into his life, that day at MIT – people to joke with, to spend money on, to get smashed and high and roofied with. Rhodes hadn’t been that different from all the other people he’d met before then, wanting something (it looked good to the higher-ups, having an in with Tony Stark, son of their biggest weapons contributor). Hadn’t been anything more than a blip on the radar, another drinking buddy, a military person he hadn’t automatically wanted to throw off a cliff, so sure, we can do business-

Rhodes had become Rhodey when he’d pulled Tony out of the rain and into his car, three weeks after his parents had died, drunk and flying (drugged, maybe, hadn’t really mattered then, and he doesn’t care now). Had become Rhodey when all he had done was take him back to his apartment, given him some clothes, and stayed up to keep watch that he wouldn’t choke on his puke in his sleep. Rhodes had wanted connections, Rhodey had brought him a plain buttered pancake and glass of water when he’d woken up, even when Tony, bleary-eyed and confused about _everything_ , had squinted his eyes and asked straight out if Rhodey was actually a platypus (the bastard, with a completely straight face, had said yes).

(Rhodey had pulled him from the sands of Afghanistan and took him home).

Rhodey is his brother, his best friend, a good man – better in the suit than Tony could have ever dreamed of being.

It’s selfish, but he’s so ridiculously happy that doesn’t have to say what he needs to, to Rhodey’s face. Doesn’t have to fracture that friendship, watch it shatter and bleed in front of him.

 

* * *

 

 

When he sleeps, he doesn’t just dream of wormholes. He doesn’t just dream of his team, bleeding and dead or dying because of him.

He dreams of two small children sitting at a table with their parents, getting ready for dinner, smiling, laughing. He dreams of watching their faces fall in terror as a shell hits their home, as their parents disappear in front of their eyes. He dreams of a little boy holding a little girl, huddled underneath a bed, shivering and crying and waiting to be saved, waiting for _Stark_ , an arm’s length away, to set off, to kill them too. For days. They wait days to die by his hand.

In his dreams, those two small children aren’t angry. Not yet. They’re not terrified. They’re haunted. Broken. Captives under a bed that looks like a cave, _too young_ , held captive by the metaphorical gun he holds to their heads. _I can kill you, I can kill, I killed your parents, I can kill you – no, you’re free_. Maybe they hadn’t been able to breathe easily. Maybe they hadn’t been able to sleep. Maybe they’d had nightmares that they could only have stopped by killing him.

Stories about himself, of his life, that he hadn’t known.

 

* * *

 

 

He debates shutting down the bots.

Without JARVIS to chastise and direct them, DUM-E makes twelve smoothies of kale and motor oil.

Butterfingers spills each and every single one on the floor while U just whirrs desolately from his spot in the corner.

Tony watches each puddle seep and grow, and thinks about killing them.

He’d be gentle, so gentle, he wouldn’t let them know, because he isn’t sure how he’d explain it, how he could tell them that he isn’t doing it because he’s angry (they’d think he’s angry, they always believe he’s angry when he teases them), that he just wants to make sure they’re safe, because _damn it. Fuck._ They’re like children, and they’ll never grow up, or be able to take care of themselves. Without JARVIS there’s no one to take care of them, to make sure that they charge, that their joints are cleaned, that they’ve been properly oiled, that they aren’t just used and not stimulated with the stupid movies or music that they all three like. It’s the only way he knows how to make sure.

He’d call them over, sign them off for a routine software upgrade (they all hate it until it’s done, and whenever they wake back up after, they always zip around the workshop like they’ve graduated to the next grade and been given energy drinks in celebration or something), and just … never sign them back on. Leave the plug undone, remove the ability for anyone to restore them.

He gets as far as DUM-E. He gets as far as touching DUM-E, who preens at the attention.

“Hey, buddy,” he soothes, running his hand over tightened joints, oddly comforted by the nicks in his frame – the bot’s come a long way from being in the bottom of ocean wreckage.

DUM-E clicks at him, claw-head turning curiously in the direction of his face, twisting one angle, then the other, the camera gleaming. He doesn’t realize he’s smiling until DUM-E taps his lips excitedly.

Doesn’t realize he’s crying until the bot pulls away wet.

“Hey, buddy,” he repeats, chokes, patting him a little harder. DUM-E can’t exactly feel it, but he always enjoys the touches. The affection. “Hey.”

 **_God!_ ** _God, God, fuck, god **damn** it!_

His hand slips.

He can’t. He can’t do it.

 

* * *

 

 

He goes to his room, and tries it out.

Presses the muzzle of the gun against his head, right at his temple, just to see how it feels.

It’s not like it had been in Afghanistan, when someone else had held it. It doesn’t dig in, doesn’t bruise, doesn’t threaten. There’s no burn on his skin, no twist of sickened, excited fear swirling in his stomach.

He feels nothing.

 

* * *

 

 

Bruce Banner had been a surprise, a damned gift that he’d had hugged too hard, wanted too much, and ruined. _Be a monster with me. Don’t make me do this alone. I know it hurts, I know you can’t stand it, but I need you to do this with me._

Tony hadn’t made Bruce’s strings, would never have made Bruce’s strings. Bruce is good, kind, a special sort of pure that only twists when made. To want to break that is horrendous.

But Tony had seen the strings after New York, their temptation growing with every inch of trust the doctor had slowly given over to him, with every ounce of his brilliance that had slowly become more and more available to his insatiable need to run from the sky. A resource with a friend attached, that’s what Bruce Banner had become to him.

What hurts about it, is that he’s pretty sure that Bruce, who he knows has only ever seen him as friend first, had realized that.

Maybe it’s why the man had left, maybe it’s not. Tony doesn’t know, doesn’t plan to ask because he doesn’t have the right to.

I know you’re scared of becoming a monster, a monster without becoming the Hulk, but I’m asking you to. I’m asking you to do something you don’t want to do, because you are a monster. Whether you want to be or not, you are.

He’d all but said the words, and they’re all lies.

The only monster who had been in the room that day had been Tony, who’d grabbed the strings people had forced the other man to grow, and directed him.

And Bruce had trusted him enough to let him, even though he’d had to know where it had been going.

 _(“There are no strings on me,”_ Ultron had hummed, pleased to be free of the shell of Tony’s creation.)

Tony is a puppet master.

He needs to cut those strings.

DUM-E, Butterfingers, and U … they like Bruce. They’d be okay with him.

 

* * *

 

 

He puts the gun back in the box, puts the box in the corner of the workshop, and blasts it into nonexistence with one magnified hit of his repulsor.

The glow, the burn on the wall, makes him blink.

That could have been the twins, had things gone differently. Gone with nothing but a mark, maybe not even that, because of him.

He eyes the gauntlet on his hand as Butterfingers rolls over to inspect the damage.

He’d made the armor to defend the world. To protect the people.

(“Don’t waste your life,” Yinsen had said)

It … isn’t himself, who does it. It’s the armor. Tony is the problem. The weapons aren’t. The armor isn’t.

Huh.

 

* * *

 

 

U holds the camera, because for some reason, he’s good at it.

DUM-E and Butterfingers are making and destroying smoothies, because it will keep them distracted.

He only wants to do this once.

“So, uh,” he says eloquently into the lens. “Hey. I mean, shit. _Hello_.”

Pepper had always said she likes it when he’s formal when addressing people.

And hell, it’s his last undeserved hurrah. He can be a little more than a bump on the log, if he wants them to listen.

“I’m Tony Stark, which you know,” he continues. “And I’m Iron Man, which you also know.” He waves his hand in dismissal. “I used to say that those two things were one in the same. That Tony Stark and Iron Man, that _the suit_ and _I,_ are one. Were. Were one.

I was wrong.”

He looks up to watch Butterfingers unsuccessfully try to carry a smoothie to him.

“You can put that on the record. It’s on video, you have proof, it’s fine. I was wrong.” He swallows, flexes his fingers, still covered in the gauntlet. “I’ve been wrong for a long time. Iron Man is Tony Stark, but Tony Stark isn’t Iron Man. Romanoff called that one pretty early on – maybe, if I hadn’t been preoccupied with dyi-preoccupied with _myself_ , I would have listened. But I was stuck in the need for power after Afghanistan … sorry, I don’t actually have a lead in to the next segment. I didn’t plan this out, no notecards.”

Insane as it is, he wants to laugh. It’s funny. Notecards. Iron Man.

“What I’m getting at here, is this. I made a promise, when I was in that cave. Not to anyone in particular, not even really ... aloud. Just a promise. That I would rid the people of everything I had ever made that could hurt them; every missile, every bomb, every single gun. I would destroy every weapon. Everyone thinks - hell, even I did, for a while - that I made the armor to protect _me_ , but it's not true. I made the armor to protect the world from what I had made.

It took me a little too long to realize to realize that it isn't really the weapons that are the problem. They're just the ... symptoms, I guess, if you want a relatable term. They're the symptoms of a sickness. And, just in case anyone hasn't caught on by now, that sickness? It's me. I’m … I’m uncontrollable. I see a broken thing, and I try to fix it, except what I’ve seen isn’t broken, only breaks after I touch it. I told … damn, I told Bruce, that the two of us were monsters, that we had to own up to it. I was only half right. I’m the monster. It’s me, and I’ve never owned up to it. I’ve … been hiding from it, trying to fix the world when all I’m doing is making it worse.”

DUM-E chirps off to the side – he’s waving a ratchet at Butterfingers in annoyance; the entire container of motor oil is on the floor, bleeding out inches from their wheels. It’ll flow in the other direction, though, toward the drain. They’re angry, but safe.

“Bruce, I need you to watch after the kids.” It comes out soft, and Tony slowly turns his eyes away from their humorous, hurting sight and back to the camera. “They need to be around a lab-ish environment, and they listen to you, so while I know you don’t really want to be back here, I’d real- no. I’d _appreciate it,_ if you could come here and take care of them for me. Full run and control of all scientific equipment. I’ve also, uh, taken care of Ross. Don’t ask. It’s just … I’ve got ya, big guy. That isn’t a problem. It’s probably even safe to call Betty. If you want. Your choice. Avengers Tower address could be tempting, I don’t know.

Um, Barton. Clint. I don’t know if you wanted the kids to go to college or not, or whatever it is parents want for kids, but if that’s a thing you and the missus are feeling, there’re three accounts set up with enough money for tuition through post-grad. Any school. And some more set aside for whatever the fuck you think you have to do to your house. I’m suggesting an archery range. Just an idea. And Romanoff- Natasha. There’s a house up near Winchester. It used to belong to my mother. It’s secluded, off the map, not a bad place to take time off and stay at when you’re trying to find yourself. Uh, Thor? Don’t know what the hell you’d need, buddy, but Jane’s funding is set for life, and Erik Selvig’s, and the interns don’t have student loan payments to worry about anymore.”

He swallows again.

“Steve.” As if the man is on the other side, can hear him and respond. “What you said that day, at the base. It’s not … It’s not right. You’re more than a soldier. You’re human. You’re allowed to feel things, to be angry, upset, disgusted with what we’ve made out of this future – you’re allowed to be lost and not know where your home is. It’s not uncommon, for war veterans. I’ve done some research – don’t look at me like that – and seriously. It’s okay to need to discover who you are again. I want you to take an opportunity to try. Find out who Steve Rogers is in the twenty-first century.

“And … if someone could extend my apologies to Wanda … I need her to know, how – sorry is so inadequate, but it’s what I’ve got. It’s all I’ve got. I’m so sorry for what you lived through, kid. For what I’ve put you through, and your brother. The Tower is, naturally, open to you. All of you. Always. Well, maybe fight Bruce for it – figuratively! I … damn it. I mean, you all get along. Or. I’ve left you all money. Get new places if you want them? I don’t know. I hate emotions. Let’s make it worse. Rhodey? Rhodey, hey, FRIDAY needs a wingman, guess who’s going to wake up to her tomorrow? Your own AI, you’re welcome. She’ll keep you up to date on diagnostic and upgrade needs on the suit – assuming the Tower is being run by responsible adults, and whatever AI Bruce has chosen to install in the Tower in her place – you can come and get that all done here. The machines are already programmed. You know how it works, platypus. Same as always.”

He should have planned this, should have made notecards. This is garbage, crap. Why had he thought this to be a good idea? Every press conference ever has been proof otherwise.

“Sorry you can’t save me this time around, Happy.” Tony tries for a grin again. “Keep an eye on Pepper, though, will you? Both eyes, all times. Don’t jump on her when you think you hear something, like you did with me – I’m kidding. I know you’ve got this. You always do. Best body guard around. Not too bad of a friend, either. A very rich bodyguard friend, come tomorrow morning. Drive around a Lambo instead of a limo. That part was serious, Hogan.”

Pepper.” His voice catches with a hitch, and hears another beep from DUM-E as he clears his throat over it. “Pepper, Pep. I wrote you a letter. Actual pen and paper, you’ll be so proud when you see it, I even made it legible. But what’s important in it, what I really, really need you to know – honey, I love you.” It catches again. “I love you. You are the best and most beautiful thing to ever happen in my life. I wasn’t lying, before. But I do love you, so much that it hurts to think about. Believe me. Please believe me.”

Metal brushes against his cheek – DUM-E’s claw is once again wet, and he’s crying.

“Wine rack,” Tony accuses, but there’s no heat to it. He clears his throat again, loudly, coughs against the burn and shoots the camera a final look as he pats the bot’s head. “I only ever wanted to protect people. With the suit, with the team, even with Ultron. I keep messing that up, and … I’m sorry. I have one last job as Iron Man, one last mess I’ve made that needs to be cleaned up, and then … that’s it. I’m … retiring. Done. When you get this, Iron Man will be Rhodey. I promise he’ll be better at it.”

He motions for U to cut the camera.

 

* * *

 

 

The bots are charging for the night.

The suits are stored.

The workshop is sorted and mopped.

He sends the video file out, shoots an email to Fury to let him know about the substantial increase in funds for the Avengers and to keep an eye out for a kid in Tennessee named Harley Keener, who, with some hands-on experience at MIT, could maybe do what Tony has been doing in a few years.

There's a TV on downstairs playing five different news stations, all questioning his role in the destruction of an entire city.

His letter to Pepper will arrive at her mother’s house in three days, and the gauntlet is still on his hand.

It’s almost clean.

 

* * *

 

 

If there’s an etiquette for this, no one’s survived to write it, and no one who’s witnessed it has dared to try.

He’s in his bedroom, a bit of guilt warring in his stomach at the sight of the pristine white sheets Pepper had picked out to match what they had had in Malibu, but it’s overwhelmed by the exhaustion weighing down on his shoulders, in his head, and without a second thought, he falls into it.

It’s not like there will be any blood. Scorch marks, yes. Maybe a hole. But no blood. Nothing that can’t be cleaned.

The silence is unnerving, stupidly deafening in the contradictory way it has, and not for the first time, Tony misses JARVIS. The sass, the sarcasm, the constantly hovering presence of a friend and guardian.

(He’d hesitated in killing the bots, decided against it in the end. Where had that logic been with JARVIS and Vision? Where had it been?)

He rolls over onto his back, stares at the ceiling as he charges up the gauntlet.

 _‘I just wanted to protect everyone,’_ he pleads to himself. _‘I just wanted to make the world safe from the things I had made. And by doing that, I made myself the worst thing it’s ever had.’_

He moves his gloved hand over his chest, fingers rubbing methodically over the bump of the scar that lays where the arc reactor used to be. He’d built the suit to protect the world, to fight against his weapons and the people controlling them. He’d made it to destroy every last one of them.

Tomorrow, they'll find the irreparable corpse of the final one.

(“Captain America,” his father had said once, glassy eyed in intoxication. “Was a good man.”)

“I want,” he whispers, straightening his hand flat – the armed repulsor burns his chest, casting a muffled blue light against the walls that reminds him of the reactor. “I want to be a good man. I wanted to be a good man.” Grits his teeth as his shoulders tense.

 _So be one, Stark_ , he sneers to himself.

 

Digs the gauntlet into his chest, and fires the repulsor.

 

 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        

 


End file.
